


oh to be a beta person

by Knope



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-16
Updated: 2016-11-16
Packaged: 2018-08-31 08:24:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8571364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Knope/pseuds/Knope
Summary: He hears a knock on his window. It persists. And when he turns around-
Oh.
He rolls over onto his feet and walks to the glass.  His hands flutter onto the shutters, but he hesitates in unlocking the latch.
Leslie smiles, and presses a hand against the glass.
(Leslie's an alpha and Ben's an omega and it's honestly just a nice wee soulmates fic)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Ok so this is kind of really weird, but i’ve been reading omega-verse fics lately and they’re interesting actually and I think it would make a super interesting parks fic for leslie and ben because:
> 
> She’s so obviously the alpha figure, but he’s... not so clear cut which makes for an interesting omega figure, someone who is reluctant with the label that has been put upon them biologically.
> 
> And so then I wrote it.
> 
> And if you’re wondering ‘wtf is this’ then please google... but also... don’t run away scared? It’s basically usually an excuse for pwp, but... I don’t really do that, so, it’s just a cute little soulmate fic basically but they’re alpha/omega mates lol

 

 Leslie Knope has always, unquestionably, been an alpha. She’s a leader, a take-charge personality, and the stereotypes of commandeering natures and steamrolling personalities just furthered this, people expecting things of her that she then fulfilled.

Ben Wyatt, however, is... not so clear cut. The stereotypes around omegas didn’t make him conform into being docile or delicate, but instead forced him the other way around. They made him hard and determined, forcing people to look at him twice.

It was hard, _god_ it was hard, being in a tiny town like partridge and being one out of three in the entire district. A wealth of betas, and around 50 alphas, but omegas...

They’re not a dominant biological gene. Something that made the realisation of his sub-gender even more surprising for his parents, the betas that they are. His siblings, betas too, couldn’t seem to comprehend either.

He wasn’t _shunned_ by his family, if anything they protected him more carefully, but he was always different. There’ll always be that confusion and hesitation in their faces and their hands as they reach out to touch him, in everything they’ve ever done since finding out.  

As a male beta, Ben would have been unremarkable. As what he is though, a male omega, he’s something for his parents to worry about, someone to be leered at, to make jokes out of, to chase after.

Sometimes he wonders if that’s why he won the election to be mayor. Because the alphas in the town thought that they might be able to get at him if they voted for his silly little dreams.

He doesn’t know. He just takes his suppressants now and covers up his natural scent before going to sort out people’s budgets.

There’s nothing interesting, like he said, about a beta working in government.

* * *

There is however, he thinks to himself, something interesting about Leslie Knope.

It can’t happen, and he should be able to quash the desire like he usually does… But this feels different. She makes him go hot and cold, and he feels compelled to look after her, bringing her waffles and soup when she gets the flu, constantly dropping off coffee to her office, and on one occasion, tidying her desk after hours before he shook himself out of it. If he wasn’t so reluctant to understand his biology he’d understand what was compelling him to make these gestures.

But he doesn’t, and Leslie doesn’t click either- and why would she? As far as she knows Ben’s just a beta, so she just takes the attention and in turn becomes unthinkingly and casually possessive, making sure to sit closest to him in meetings and suggesting that they carpool to work, her touches (to his arm, his elbow, his back, gently clashing knees under desks) becoming more and more commonplace.

Until it all comes to a head. 

* * *

They're having a parks meeting after the success of the Harvest Festival, discussing what's next. Leslie's smiling up at him and he's never felt so warm. 

Maybe a little _too_ warm.

He begins to falter with his speech. "So... the harvest... the harvest fest... festival..."

“Ben?” Leslie asks. “Ben are you-“

“I just-“ it’s hot,  it’s suddenly far too hot in this room, Ben struggling with his tie as sweat begins to ball up on his forehead, his face shining with the effort it takes him to tug open the knot in his tie, hands shaking as he flounders in front of the group.

Suddenly, Ron’s up out of his seat and running out of the building. And before Leslie has time to wonder _what the hell_ , she realizes why.

“ _Oh_ ,” she says, eyes dilating as Ben’s condition becomes clear to her. And _god_ does it become clear to her as she eyes Ben up hungrily. He just... He smells... He _smells_...

Before she knows what’s happening, Leslie’s reaching across the table and pawing for any part of Ben that she can reach- his wrist, in this instance, clasping the skin there and running her fingers over it, pulling at him to try and get him closer, desperate for him to just be _closer_ \-- _why isn’t he closer?_

And then Chris is just _on_ her- he’s come out of nowhere- slamming her back into her seat and standing between her and Ben so that she can’t see him, just smell him, his smell _intoxicating_ , and god, why is he so far away from her? He can’t be- this isn’t- “ _Bennn_ ,” she moans lowly, trying to fight her way around Chris who stands strong, pushing her down and away from Ben- and why is he _doing_ that? Doesn’t he know that Ben- Ben, Ben, _Ben,_ all she can think about is that smell, is Ben, Ben who she can hear whimpering faintly in the corner, Leslie ducking left and right to try and see him and smell him and get at him and-

“ _You need to calm down, Leslie_!” she hears Chris say in the back of her mind, but how can she calm down when Ben’s being pushed further out of her sight, Ann- Ann! Ann’s here! Ann can help her, can get Chris away from her so she can have Ben, be next to Ben, claim Ben-

“... _So weird_ ,” April breathes out from the corner, eyes wide as she, Donna and Tom watch Leslie desperately try to shirk around Chris and get to Ben who’s just _sweating_ in the corner, eyes glazed as he stares up at Ann who’s asking him things about _suppressants_ and _what brand and when, Ben,_ as he just reaches for the top button of his shirt, Ann gently taking his hands as he whimpers a little.

And then-

“ _Leslie_!” Chris yells as she just _battle-rams_ through him to get to Ben, hands reaching for his skin greedily. She makes it into his corner of the room, grabbing at his forearms and pushing him away from Ann, manhandling him between her body and the side wall, her hands pressing against his face, his neck, his hair, Ben arching into it with his face falling into absolute _bliss_ at her touch. And it’s then- leaning her head down to his neck, nose nuzzling at Ben’s pulse point as his heart beats wildly out of control, pushing her body into his, flattening him against the wall as she fixes her lips to the throbbing vein at his neck, Ben desperately twisting to give her better access, his own hands spasming against the wall as she steps between his legs- that she’s grabbed around the waist and hauled to the other side of the room, beating her fists against Donna and Chris as they each take a wrist to fix her to the back wall.

Ben’s moaning from where he is, face flushed and neck red from her lips, eyes heavy with hazy lust as he moans confusedly, hands lazily reaching around Ann-and now Tom and April too- for Leslie as they shepherd him out of the room and then the building, leaving Leslie writhing against Donna and Chris, a slave to Ben’s increasingly potent pheromones.

“She’ll be better in her office,” Chris says after a few minutes of Leslie struggling against the two, and they walk her next door, away from Ben’s lingering scent.

Leslie still struggles, but slowly and with less fervour, the effects of Ben’s scent wearing off.

Her faces loses its flush, her pupils reduce, and her arms come to a still as Donna and Chris let her fall into the seat behind her desk.

She blinks, closing her eyes for a good few seconds before opening them again and looking up at Chris.

“...How long has Ben been an omega for?” She asks nonsensically.

“Certainly the entire time he’s been here,” Chris replies, sounding just as shell-shocked as Leslie, actually.

“Oh god,” Leslie mutters, before doubling over in her chair, the guilt rising up from stomach and into her throat- she wants to throw it up, to be able to stop seeing Ben’s breathless face before her eyes, stop feeling his pulse under her lips, stop hearing his whispered moans in her ear as she made her way up his neck; stop feeling the arch of his back into her chest, his hands pinned in hers, so open and needy and utterly vulnerable in front of her, and what had she done? She’d taken advantage and-

And-

_And_ Leslie realizes that she’d do it again. She would do what she did in there to him again and again, over and over if history repeated itself. She’s- she’d- she feels this need inside of her, this _need_ to just find him, to find Ben and claim him, to make him hers and only hers, _her_ omega, _her_ Ben. It’s so prehistorical and guttural and barbaric, but the feeling thrums inside of her, spurring her on.

Before it was psychological. She liked Ben because of who he was, because of his slim build and his nice eyes, because of his love for politics and quiet understanding of her political dreams, because of his favourite movies being a combination of sci-fi and documentaries, because of the way that he stares at her like she’s beautiful and powerful, and like that second attribute only makes her _more_ attractive, not less. And she still does, god does she love him for all of these reasons, but now... Now it’s biological too.

The scent isn’t there but she can still smell him, can see him, can taste him, and none of it is enough. She wants more, and she wants it now. His smell, god his _smell_. Mark had never felt that way as a beta, and neither had any of her other boyfriends. They too though, she supposes, were alphas and betas, biology closer to her own, scents closer to her own, temperaments closer to her own.

But Ben... Even compared to Ann and the other omegas she’s been in close range to in the town... She wants to just _inhale_ him, sit in his presence and take in every bit of him piece by piece.  She loves him, she realizes, the biology proving facts that her brain were just beginning to catch up to.

She loves him.

Her eyes snap up to Chris’, hands still, breathing steady and eyes clear.

“Ben’s mine.”

* * *

Ben’s hunched over in the passenger seat of Ann’s car, breathing heavily with his hands running up and down his pant-legs unsettlingly. His head is hanging low over his chest, eyes closed and eyebrows furrowed. His fingers keep clenching into his flesh, feet curling into the carpet, and April and Tom just can’t stop _staring_ , like they don’t know what they’re seeing.

An omega- a male one at that- in heat.

And to be fair, in a town like Pawnee, she’s not particularly surprised. They’re not... She and Ben aren’t _rare_ , exactly, a little less uncommon than alphas, sure, and certainly disproportionate to the number of betas, but it’s where Pawnee _is_ exactly that makes the presence of omegas unusual. Historically omegas were... well, shipped to cities on the coasts to sell, and since then, that’s where the majority have stayed. Omegas aren’t as discriminated against in big cities, in places where they’re not such a minority, and it’s been that way for decades now. So yes, sure, there are omegas in Pawnee and in central America, but it’s not as if they actively _come_ to these places like Ben did, the opportunities for omegas much bigger in the cities where they’re not such a talking point, for god’s sake. Here, omegas are more traditionally seen. Three quarters of Pawnee’s registered omegas are homemakers: stay at home parents or househusbands and wives, the other quarter working in ‘omega-friendly’ industries. They work in retail; in libraries; as nurses. They certainly didn’t stand out in government in small towns. Unless there were others using scent blockers and heat suppressants like Ben.

Beside her, Ben lets out a low groan, and tries to fold in on himself, attempting to stay still- and decent- not doing his body any favours.

God it must be bad.

“It is,” he chokes out- she must have spoken aloud. “It’s bad, so, so bad, Ann, I-“

He whimpers, and in a moment of- she doesn’t even know _what_ to call it- April’s hand shoots forward into the front, and grabs onto Ben’s, desperately offering him some sort of comfort.

Maybe it’s because of the animalistic tendencies that he’s showing right now. Ben’s in pain, a slave to his biology, and April- April understands, to an extent. Quietly sympathizes.

Ann sees him squeeze back, eyes opening for the first time in about ten minutes.

“Shit,” she mutters upon seeing his pupils. His eyes aren’t brown anymore, but black, completely and utterly dilated. “Ben... when was the last time you even had a heat?” She asks him suddenly. “I know you had to change your suppressants since the extended stay in Pawnee, but have you ever even-“

“Fourteen years,” he blurts out, and she can’t help but wince. “I’ve been on them permanently since- _oh god_ \- I left college.”

Ben hasn’t experienced a heat for fourteen years. _Fourteen years_.

That’s-

“A hundred and sixty eight,” he says again. “I’ve put off over a hundred of these I can’t even-“

That’s the last thing he says to them before he loses focus again, eyes snapping shut as his body overpowers his brain.

April’s hand is abandoned.

* * *

“Leslie-“ Chris starts.

“No,” she snaps. “I mean it, he’s _mine_.”

Donna looks torn between addressing this situation or buying some popcorn for the upcoming porno that will be- and it _will_ be, Leslie’s convinced- her life in about half an hour.

“Look,” she says, “I know this is all very shocking that Ben has secretly been an omega this whole time, oh my god, etc. etc., but all I care about, Chris, is going to take care of him, alright?”

“No it is not alright, Leslie Knope!” He says. “You just want to use Ben for his body!”

It’s like watching a tennis match, Donna thinks. A weird, sex-orientated tennis match.

“The only thing about Ben being in heat that I care about, Chris, is getting him through it!”

“By sex!” He squawks. “You want to have sexual relations with Ben because of the pheromones he’s putting off, and now you’re just using your alpha...ness,” he says, struggling for his words, “To pass it off as a solution to a very genuine medical emergency!”

An emergency of wanting to get into Leslie’s pants, Donna thinks.

“Chris he’s going to be suffering for days! I can help- I want to help! And I- I wanted to be with him before this, ok? This changes nothing, except the timing, don’t you understand that? He needs me,” she says suddenly. “Ben needs me, Chris.”

“You’re deluded, Leslie, and I won’t-“

“Try to stop me,” is all she says as she walks out of the parks department.

He doesn’t.

* * *

Finally, the four of them reach April and Andy’s.

Ann grabs Ben around the waist as April digs for her keys. As she does so, Ann realizes something.

“Andy,” she says, “What about-“

April’s face flashes a little indignantly. “My husband doesn’t want to have sex with Ben, Ann,” She drawls.

“I-his scent though, he-“

“We’ve seen things about Ben that no one wants to know,” is all that April says in reply. “No one living in this house wants to service that man,” she says, pointing a finger at Ben, who’s too busy trying to toe off his socks to notice any of them. The heat feels like it’s creeping into every part of his skin, into his veins, his brain, his _toes_ for god’s sake.

“Fine,” is all Ann says in response, hoping for the best as she leads Ben inside with a hand to his back.

What they should be more worried about, is Leslie.

* * *

She’s in the carpark when Ron comes up to her.

“Leslie,” he says. “Don’t do this.”

“Do what, Ron? I’m just going home for the day and hey! I might visit a man about a horse on the way back, actually. And when I say horse I do of course mean Lil Sebastian.”

He doesn’t move.

“Lil Sebastian, Ron, I need to go for the good of Pawnee.”

“I’ve had two wives, Leslie. Both omegas who used their incredible sexual powers against me.”

“Nope,” Leslie says, shaking her head and wincing, “I don’t need to hear this even a little bit, Ron.”

“And I let them. But Ben isn’t like that, and this isn’t some trick to get you to bond with him, Leslie. If you go to him now, you’re taking advantage, and if you think that he’ll just be fine with it after the heat is over, then you’re wrong. That was not a man in charge of his actions in there, Leslie. But you have a choice.”

She doesn’t say a word.

“I-“

“Don’t mistakenly think that you’re doing something for him, Leslie.”

Her heart’s beating fast, but for a different reason now.

“Because you’re not.”

No. Maybe not. Maybe she’s _not_ doing this because she and Ben share something. Maybe she’s doing it because she’s deluded herself into thinking that she and Ben love each other. Maybe she’s entranced by the idea of a male omega, of someone like Ben who’s so compatible with her also being sexually compatible with her. Biologically, they’re perfect for each other. And maybe she just wants to explore this.

Or maybe,

Just _maybe_ ,

She and Ben are more than all of that.

She gets into her car. Thinks about what she wants.

* * *

Ben’s curled up on his bed, lying uncomfortably in a thin shirt and boxers.

“I’d- _oh_ ,” he says as another wave seems to hit him. “I’d forgotten what this was like,” he chokes out as Ann comes back in with water and a pack of energy bars.

She looks down at him with empathy as he shuts his eyes and grabs his knees, looking for some sort of relief. It’s not pity, because Ann understands what the heat is like, a relentless need to just _be_ with someone.

With Leslie, she thinks.

“It’s... It’s ok when you’ve got someone with you.” She says finally.

“Is it?” he whines, “Because I just- how can - it feels like _nobody_ could solve this.”  He’s sweating again, turning to lie face down on the mattress, arms and legs splayed out like he’s trying not to let anything touch.

She sits on the other side of the bed.

“It’s better than ok, actually, it’s great. It’s- it’s a lot of really great sex that won’t let up if you’re with the right person.” She smiles.

“With the right person,” he repeats, fingers caught in the fabric of the duvet.

“Not with... Not with someone wrong.” She tells him. “That’s- that’s not so... It’s not as simple as it seems.”

He huffs out a laugh. “This is already far too complicated, Ann,” face screwed up as he twists around on the bed again.

She thinks that it’s time to leave him. She can... she can see why Leslie likes him though. There’s something soft about those hard edges of his.

“I’m sorry I can’t give you anything...”

“No,” he says, “I- yeah. See you in a few days, I suppose,” he jokes.

She smiles weakly. She’ll be back sooner than that, especially since it seems like this is going to last quite a bit longer than a few days.

Fourteen years, she thinks to herself. Fourteen years of hiding away and trying to forget about the truth of his biology.

She wants to ask more, but this isn’t the time. She tells him to lock the door behind her instead.

* * *

Andy comes home and asks if Ben cooked something nice for dinner.

“Why, can you smell something?” April asks, eyes narrowed.

“Mmm, just a nice sort of smell, y’know?”

“It’s not for us,” she tells him, leaning up to steal a kiss.

Andy doesn’t really mind.

* * *

Leslie parks her car. Feels in her heart that this is the right decision. She feels it in her veins and her lungs and her _head_ that this is the right decision.    

She gets out and walks to the right.

* * *

He hears a knock on his window. It persists. And when he turns around-

Oh.

He rolls over onto his feet and walks to the glass.  His hands flutter onto the shutters, but he hesitates in unlocking the latch.

Leslie smiles, and presses a hand against the glass. She can’t smell him from out here, but she can see him, and just the sight makes her heart stutter a little.

Because she does love him.

Ben puts one of his hands up against the glass too. The other he uses to flick the latch open, and open out the window.

He reaches out a hand and she takes it, climbing inside. The window’s rather high so she slips a little on the way in, and when she finally manages to swing her second leg over the frame she overshoots the mark a little, and ends up falling into Ben, who catches her, but can’t stop them from falling to the ground.

His body hums under hers, and she knows that in a second it will be different, but right now this feels calm. Simple and without tension and right.

“I love you, you know.” She says, head hanging over his.

His eyes widen.

“I think you’re the right person,” is what he says back. “I love you too.”

(Unsaid: _let’s do this.)_

 

 

 


End file.
